


Drink Tea And Carry On

by Lexigent



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-18
Updated: 2010-11-18
Packaged: 2017-10-13 06:34:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/134072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lexigent/pseuds/Lexigent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A bit of fluff. Wherein Sherlock gets caught in the rain, John gets his doctor on, a door is broken down, and it all ends with tea, chicken soup, and blankets.</p><p>Comments are love, as always :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drink Tea And Carry On

**Author's Note:**

> I started out intending to write something quiet and domestic for prettybirdy, who wanted a story where either Sherlock or John get caught out in the rain. Then my John Muse got chatty and insisted he needed to do doctorish things and kick down a door. So I put the two together.
> 
> Huge thanks to my fabulous beta, alltoseek. You did an amazing job. Written for prettybirdy979.

Rain drips down on the roof, trickles down the window, runs in gushing currents down the streets, into wells and, in some cases, straight back out of them again. Streets get flooded, dips turn into puddles, soaked pedestrians shout at careless car-drivers.  
Baker Street, John thinks as he looks out the window, looks more like a river than a street. He’s glad he doesn’t have to work today. You really wouldn’t let a cat out in that kind of weather, let alone a dog.  
Speaking of which, there is an all-too-familiar figure making its way up the street. John sighs at the sight of it. Sherlock’s coat clings to his body, his hair sticks to the sides of his face. It doesn’t take a huge deductive leap to see that he has been caught out in the rain.

 _And did he even notice_ , John wonders as he creeps downstairs into the living-room. For all he knows, the man is impervious to undernourishment and sleep deprivation, so John wouldn’t be surprised to find out that rain has no noticeable effect on him either.  
He comes down the stairs just as Sherlock enters the living-room, struggling to get out of his coat. There is a puddle underneath him already - that coat absorbs a lot of water - and his suit is wet at the shoulders. His shirt, too, is soaked through and discoloured from the rain, sticking to Sherlock’s body and making his silhouette even more angular.

John can’t help but smirk. “Look what the cat dragged in.”  
Sherlock turns his head abruptly to face him, sending a million droplets flying in all directions.  
“Just a drainpipe, John. No cat.”  
“What... Oh, never mind.”  
John shakes his head and goes through to the kitchen to put the kettle on. The familiar ritual of making tea is comforting: two fresh mugs, teabags, sugar and, amazingly, milk.  
He sets the mugs down on the living-room table. Sherlock is perched on a chair, Blackberry in hand, still in the same clothes. The cushions are starting to soak up the moisture.  
“Sherlock.”  
He holds out a hand. John exhales and places one of the mugs in it.  
“You’re welcome, but...”  
Sherlock lifts an eyebrow.  
“...maybe you should, you know... change?”  
“In a minute.” Sherlock’s eyes are fixed on the Blackberry.  
John sits down opposite him and starts drinking his tea. This could be entertaining...

A few minutes later he is draining the dregs. Sherlock is staring into space now, his fingers steepled in front of his face. He is, literally, dripping wet. Water runs down from his wet, messy hair, over his cheeks, into his shirt collar. And while it’s fascinating to watch the patterns and tracks that the drops create on Sherlock’s skin, which is acquiring a bluish tint, John does think it’s high time the man got out of those clothes.  
He gets up, moves behind Sherlock and tugs at his suit jacket from behind, which obviously meets with resistance from Sherlock’s posture.  
“Oh, what _now_?”  
“You’ve been sitting here, in damp clothes, for the past ten minutes. I don’t know how long you’ve been out there, but judging from your skin temperature - or lack thereof - and the speed at which you’re going Blue Meanie, I’d say: quite a while. So if you’re not going to do anything about it, I bloody well will. I’m not going to sit and watch while you catch pneumonia or something because this is the kind of attitude that will end you one day.”  
Sherlock blinks and drops his arms and lets John take his jacket off.  
“That was unexpected.”  
“Was it though. I know you like your corpses, but I prefer you alive, thanks.” He’s beside Sherlock now, unbuttoning the clammy shirt. “You are actually hypothermic. Does that even register?”  
No response. The shirt flops to the floor.  
“Now.” He drags Sherlock off the chair and into the bathroom. “Get in there, have a hot shower, wrap up.” He slams the door shut. “For God’s sake.”  
He grabs his laptop and starts writing up some of his notes from their most recent case. With a fleeting smile he acknowledges the sound of the shower starting in the bathroom. Playing the violin and not talking for days on end were only the bottom of the list of Worst Things About Sherlock. Not for the first time, John finds himself wondering what the hell he’s doing here. But deep down, he knows, so he makes another mug of tea and carries on typing.

The shower is still on when he’s finished the mug, and he is a slow drinker and a slower typist.  
“Sherlock?”  
Silence.  
He makes his way to the bathroom door and knocks. “Sherlock? Are you alright in there?”  
Nothing. He tries the door handle, but it’s locked from the inside.  
 _Oh bollocks._  
His elbow crashes against the door, then his shoulder. Something gives with a snap and he’s inside. The shower is running, the tiny room is steamy like a sauna and Sherlock is on the floor.  
John doesn’t think, he acts. Turns off the shower. Grabs a towel to get a better grip on his naked and wet and slippery flatmate. Drags him out of the shower. Out of the bathroom. Gets him in recovery position on the towel on the living-room floor. Checks for a pulse. For breath.  
Sherlock is unconscious, but breathing. John dries him off, wraps him in a blanket, sits beside him and waits.

A little later, Sherlock is on the couch, wearing John’s striped terry cloth dressing-gown, a bowl of instant chicken soup in his hand.  
“You know, there’s one thing that baffles me,” John says, in the testiest voice he can muster. He is standing by the table, arms folded in front of his chest, glaring.  
“How on earth did you manage to live to your thirties? I mean, how did you even survive before we met?”  
Sherlock stares into his bowl of soup. “You’re not the first person to ask that question.”  
John slumps down onto the chair on the other side of the table. “Tell me more?”  
“You don’t want to know. You are different from all the others though.”  
John smiles weakly. “Oh yeah?”  
“Yes. You’re still here.”  
Right. John blinks, wets his lips and leans forward.  
“Sherlock, listen. You’re underfed and exhausted and you’re possibly ill, and while I am a doctor, I am not your personal physician. Now. I was going to spend the evening with Sarah. Do you think you can manage to keep yourself out of trouble for the duration? And by ‘out of trouble’ I mean ‘a damn good distance from the brink of death’. Can you do that, just for one night?”  
Sherlock nods, suddenly looking very young and very fragile. John feels his heart giving a leap in spite of himself.  
“Good.”  
He leans back and looks outside. The rain is still streaking the windows.


End file.
